Thursday March 14th Local Sports

MASON CITY – For the third time this season, NIACC freshman Mandy Willems has been selected as the NJCAA Division II national player of the week for the week of March 4-10.

Willems, 5-9 guard from Ackley, helped guide the Lady Trojans to the Region XI title and a berth in next week’s national tournament. Willems was selected as the regional tournament MVP. She averaged 22.3 points per game in the three tournament wins.

Willems scored 20 points in the tournament opener against Little Priest Tribal College. She scored 31 points, including eight 3-point goals, in the semifinal win over Iowa Central and scored 16 points in the championship against Kirkwood.

Willems also earned national player of the week honors during the weeks of Oct. 29-Nov. 3 and Feb. 25-March 3. She also was selected as the Iowa Community College Athletic Conference player of the week five times in the 2018-19 season.

CHICAGO — Iowa opens play as the six seed in the Big Ten tournament later this evening. Coming in on a four game losing streak, head coach Fran McCaffery knows is not ideal, but happens over the course of a season.

McCaffery expects his team to respond in Chicago.

Iowa faces 11th-seed Illinois, who beat 14th-seed Northwestern 74-69 in overtime last night. You can hear the Iowa-Illinois game on AM-1300 KGLO starting with the pre-game at 7:30 with the tipoff scheduled for around 8:30.

=== other Big Ten Tournament games today

11:30 — #8 seed Ohio State vs. #9 seed Indiana

2:00 — #5 seed Maryland vs. #13 seed Nebraska

6:00 — #7 seed Minnesota vs. #10 seed Penn State

KANSAS CITY — Iowa State opens play later today at the Big 12 Conference basketball tournament in Kansas City against Baylor. Head coach Steve Prohm expects a big turnout from Cyclone Nation.

Entering the tourney on a three game losing slide, Prohm looks for his team to rebound.

Tipoff is scheduled for 11:30 this morning

=== other Big 12 Tournament games today

1:30 — #1 seed Kansas State vs. #8 seed TCU

6:00 — #2 seed Texas Tech vs. #10 seed West Virginia

8:00 — #3 seed Kansas vs. #6 seed Texas

BOONE — The Iowa High School Athletic Association’s Board of Control has named Tom Keating as their next executive director starting on July 1st. Keating is currently the president at Xavier High School in Cedar Rapids. A native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Keating began his career as a teacher and coach at Maxwell High School in 1977 before starting an award-winning run as a teacher, coach, and activities director at Wahlert, Dubuque in 1980. Wahlert won 11 state volleyball championships with Keating as head coach, and he was named NFHS National Coach of the Year for volleyball in 2003. He moved to Xavier as principal in 2004 and was named the National Catholic Educational Association’s Educator of the Year in 2010. Keating became president at Xavier in 2018. A longtime advisory committee member for the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union, Keating served on the IHSAA’s Board of Control from 2008-18 and was chairperson in 2014-15. Keating was a 2003 inductee to the National High School Athletic Coaches Association’s Hall of Fame. He has been an adjunct instructor and authored five graduate-level courses for Drake University. Keating will replace Alan Beste, who previously announced he’d be retiring after serving as the executive director since 2015.